Both the Washington attorney general and state judges have ruled thatstate public employees do not have the right to strike.

District officials sent automated calls to parents and staff explainingtheir response to the strike. Athletics will continue since coaches arecovered under a different contract.

Tacoma teachers have been working without a contract since school startedSept. 1. The union and district negotiated Saturday but couldn't agree ona contract proposal.

A strike vote at the end of August failed by about 28 votes. Union bylawsrequire approval by 80 percent of the nearly 1,900 members to authorize astrike.

Since the last strike vote was so close, the union decided to allowmembers with schedule conflicts to vote early. About 200 union memberswith after-school responsibilities like coaching voted Friday or Saturday,Wood said. This time, 1,623 of the union's 1,869 members voted to walkout, he said.

A 2006 state attorney general's opinion said state and local publicemployees - including teachers - have no legally protected right tostrike. That opinion also noted state law lacks specific penalties forstriking public employees.

During several past teacher strikes, Washington school districts have goneto court and judges have ordered teachers back to work.

In Washington, only the Seattle and Spokane school districts are largerthan Tacoma.

Tacoma teachers earned an average salary of $63,793 during last schoolyear, according to the district. They are the best-paid teachers in PierceCounty and about the fifth-highest paid among the state's largestdistricts, behind teachers in Everett, Northshore, Seattle and Bellevue,according to state data.

The Legislature included in its state budget a 1.9 percent cut in teacherpay but left it up to school districts to figure out how to save thatmoney. Some districts have made cuts elsewhere, some have cut teacher pay,and others have worked out compromises with their local teachers union.

The News Tribune reports that on the issue of pay, the district saidSunday it has offered teachers two options.

They could maintain the current pay schedule and sacrifice pay for onepersonal day, one individual optional training day and one school-widetraining day. Or they could accept an effective 1.35 percent cut in thesalary schedule. In exchange, teachers would be allowed to schedule 2.5furlough days.

The district said it has also offered to keep class size maximums at thecurrent level. The union wants to decrease class sizes, but the districtsays subtracting one child per class could cost the district about $1.8million a year.